The second season of the Emmy award-winning television series, The Handmaid’s Tale, is set to premiere April 25th. While Margaret Atwood wrote her dystopian novel over thirty years ago, the success of the program shows how relevant it still is today. If you find yourself wanting more, check out these other science fiction and dystopian novels!
Red Clocks, by Leni Zumas, follows five women in an America where abortion is illegal once again. Like The Handmaid’s Tale, it explores a world in which women do not have control over their own bodies.
In The Power, Naomi Alderman imagines a future in which gender roles have reversed. Women discover a physical power within their bodies, and the novel describes how the world transforms as women become physically stronger than men.
In Gather the Daughters, Jennie Melamed invents an island colony where breeding is controlled and gender relations are ritualistic. Like The Handmaid’s Tale, knowledge is rationed and women are oppressed in these patriarchal societies.
Hillary Jordan’s When She Woke centers on Hannah, a women who must try to survive in America after she has been labeled a murderer. The main feature of Jordan’s future is that criminals are no longer sent to prison, but must live among the population after their skin has been genetically altered to reflect the color of their crime.
Lastly, another classic dystopian novel has been adapted for the screen. Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 has been made into a TV movie set to come out this summer.
Find more dystopian reads in the catalog!